NCSE Honors "Friends of Darwin" for 2005

Every year, NCSE honors a
few exceptional people for
their support of evolution education
and/or their service to NCSE.
The "Friend of Darwin" awards are
proposed by the staff and
approved by the board at its annual
meeting; the recipients for the
award for a given year are thus
selected in the spring of the following
year. NCSE usually arranges for the awards to be presented to
their recipients by their family, colleagues,
and friends, so it often
takes a while before a public
announcement is possible. Here,
finally, are the Friends of Darwin
for 2005.

Ed Barber served as the director
of the college and trade department
for the publisher WW Norton
and Company, where he is now a
senior editor. NCSE Supporter
Laurie R Godfrey writes that
Barber "took great pleasure in
working with me on the first edition
of Scientists Confront
Creationism. Ed is a kind-hearted
and knowledgeable editor; he has a
sophisticated knowledge of evolutionary
biology, having worked so
closely and for so many years with
one of my own mentors from
Harvard, Stephen Jay Gould, among
others. He was especially proud, I
think, to have published a series of
popular Gould books, including
compilations of the articles that he
wrote for Natural History magazine.
Most of all, he knows how to
help authors connect with the
general public."

Fred Edwords is currently the
leader of the United Coalition of
Reason. He previously served as
director of communications for the
American Humanist Association,
after having served as its executive
director from 1984 to 1999 and as
editor of its journal The Humanist from 1994 to 2006. Back in the heyday
of creationism/evolution
debates, Edwords was on the front
lines, debating such creationist
luminaries as Duane Gish and
Henry M Morris of the Institute for
Creation Research. As a result of his
debate experiences, he cofounded
and edited the journal Creation/Evolution from 1980 to
1991, originally published by the
AHA but acquired by NCSE in
1991. He also served on NCSE's
board of directors from 1982 to
1992. "Fred's knowledge, experience,
and plain horse sense combined to make him a formidable ally
in the evolution wars," commented
NCSE's executive director Eugenie C Scott.

Jack Krebs, a high school
teacher in Lawrence, Kansas, is a
former president and current board
member of Kansas Citizens for
Science (http://www.kcfs.org),
the grassroots organization that
fought effectively for the integrity
of science education in Kansas
when the state board of education
rewrote the state science standards
to disparage the scientific status of
evolution in 1999 and again in
2005. Always civil, always cogent,
Krebs was tireless in his speaking
and writing on behalf of the
uncompromised teaching of evolution
in the Sunflower State; thanks
to his and KCFS's work, a scientifically
appropriate and pedagogically
responsible treatment of evolution
was restored to the state science
standards when moderates
regained power on the board in
2001 and again in 2007.

Steve Rissing is professor of
evolution, ecology, and organismal
biology at the Ohio State
University, and a member of the
board of Ohio Citizens for Science
(http://www.ohioscience.org),
the grassroots organization that
fought effectively for the integrity
of science education in Ohio when
the state board of education adopted
"critical analysis" language in its
state science standards in 2002 and
then adopted a corresponding
model lesson plan derived from
creationist sources in 2004. Always
concerned with the public understanding
of science in general, he
also played a major role in revamping
the way introductory-level biology
courses are taught at Ohio
State, coauthored a debunking
treatment of creationist myths
about Haeckel for The American
Biology Teacher, and contributed a
bimonthly column about science
to the Columbus Dispatch.

Carl Zimmer is the author of
such popular books about evolution
and related topics as
Evolution: The Triumph of an Idea, revised edition (New York:
Harper Perennial, 2006), which
Scientific American's reviewer
described as "as fine a book as one
will find on the subject"; The Smithsonian Intimate Guide to
Human Origins (New York:
HarperCollins, 2005); Microcosm: E coli and the New Science of Life
(New York: Pantheon, 2008), and
the forthcoming textbook The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to
Evolution (Greenwood Village
[CO]: Roberts and Company,
2009). His honors include the
American Association for the
Advancement of Sciences Science
Journalism Award in 2004 and the
National Academies Science
Communication Award in 2007 for
"his diverse and consistently interesting
coverage of evolution and
unexpected biology."

Michael Zimmerman is Dean
of the College of Liberal Arts and
Sciences and Professor of Biology
at Butler University. In 2004, concerned
about attempt to undermine
the teaching of evolution in
Grantsburg, Wisconsin, he recruited
local members of the Christian
clergy to endorse a statement
affirming the compatibility of evolutionary
science with their faith.
So successful was the Clergy Letter
Project that Zimmerman took it
national; today, there are almost 12
000 signatories from Christian
denominations, with hundreds in
parallel projects for Unitarian
Universalist clergy and rabbis.
Zimmerman also organized the
Evolution Weekend project, in
which members of the clergy conduct
events centering on evolution
and faith on or around Darwin's
birthday; over 1000 churches participated
in 2009. He is also helping
to connect scientists with
members of the clergy who have
questions about science.

Finally, special Friend of Darwin
awards were conveyed to the
eleven plaintiffs in Kitzmiller v.
Dover, the seminal 2005 case
establishing the unconstitutionality
of teaching "intelligent design"
creationism in the public schools
— Tammy Kitzmiller, Bryan
Rehm, Christy Rehm, Deborah
Fenimore, Joel Lieb, Steven
Stough, Beth Eveland, Cynthia
Sneath, Julie Smith, Aralene
"Barrie" D Callahan, and
Frederick B Callahan — in
recognition of their bravery in
challenging the Dover Area School
Board's policy of requiring a disclaimer
about evolution to be read
to students in Dover's high school.
The awards were presented in
2007 by Kevin Padian, the president
of NCSE's board of directors,
at a gathering of the plaintiffs and
their friends and supporters to
watch Judgment Day: Intelligent
Design on Trial, the NOVA documentary
about the case.

We thank these and all NCSE
members for their support of our
organization and our mission. We
cannot — and do not — do it alone!